


the heart of me

by emblems



Series: all at once [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Related, Marriage Proposal, POV Second Person, this is so self-indulgent i'm not sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-31
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-05-10 13:43:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5588149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emblems/pseuds/emblems
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There’s a moment of hesitation before he takes both your hands in his. You look at his wrists and know if you were to adjust your grip, you’d feel his pulse, fast and unsteady.</p>
<p>You know this because your heart’s doing the same to you; almost all at once, you realize where this conversation is going. </p>
<p>[ i really needed to write the chapter eleven proposal scene for personal, self-indulgent reasons. second person, gender-neutral pov. ]</p>
            </blockquote>





	the heart of me

**Author's Note:**

> i really do want to emphasize that i didn't include any indications of gender or name in this fic—i want my self-indulgence to be _your_ self-indulgence, so visualize/conceptualize this however you like.
> 
> dialogue is largely taken direct from canon, though i did make some pretty liberal changes.

It occurs to you that Flavia and Basilio’s discussion of what to do with Gangrel’s body probably deserves your attention.

Truthfully, though, the only thing you’re even slightly aware of is Chrom’s presence at your side. 

The war is over and that means a halidom to rebuild, insurgencies to dismantle, troops to see to—it means the headache has only just begun.

So, for the moment, you let yourself focus on Chrom, a portrait of steadiness weathered by exhaustion. A bone-deep weariness weighs on his shoulders, and you lean into it easily. 

The back of his hand brushes against yours. He issues his orders to Frederick, the words reaching you through what seems to be cotton in your ears. 

_It’s over._  

Chrom turns to exchange words with Flavia, and now you begin to make out words. 

“… must go take stock of our men. We’ll be sure to continue this conversation later, but for now it can wait. We celebrate tonight, Chrom—enjoy it.” 

When the khans walk away, you go to move with them. Chrom shifts, and you become aware of his hand around your wrist. 

“Chrom?” you ask, voice rough with dust and an exhaustion that stretches beyond a need for sleep and into something much deeper. 

He squeezes, and you look up from his hand to meet his eyes. 

“I think I owe you an apology,” he says. He lets go of your wrist and gestures to the landscape around you—the smoke, the dust, the blood on the ground. “This wasn’t your war to fight.”

“But it was one I chose for myself,” you reply. “For my own reasons—you off all people ought to know by now that I wouldn’t have done this if I didn’t want to.” 

You almost tell him that if it was within your power, you’d wage war on every one of his demons, but somehow you think that might be a little forward. 

“It’s hard to argue with that,” he says. He pauses, and you wait for him to form the words clearly on his mind. The hand gripping Falchion tightens. “All I’ve been thinking about is stopping Gangrel, no matter the cost. Even my own life would not have been a price too high to pay.” 

You think back on the past few days—the long nights, the edge in Chrom’s voice, and the set of his shoulders. You remember the time spent with him on the battlefield, remember how he was more a fire burning through the waste than he was a man. 

No, the words aren’t exactly a surprise. 

“It would have been for us,” you say, and he looks at you, eyes just shy of wide. “And for me, for that matter.” 

He inhales, a small sound that nonetheless has the pull of a strong river current, pulling your gaze back to his. 

A moment passes, heavy with the months the two of you have spent together, forming strategies and forging a partnership. 

“I’ve been thinking about more than Gangrel, if I’m speaking truthfully,” he says after a moment. “I’ve been thinking about Ylisse, about Emmeryn—everything, really, but I keep—I keep coming back to you." 

He takes a step closer, so that you’re barely two hands-breadths apart.  

There’s a moment of hesitation before he takes both your hands in his. You look at his wrists and know if you were to adjust your grip, you’d feel his pulse, fast and unsteady.

You know this because your heart’s doing the same to you; almost all at once, you know exactly where this conversation is going. 

“You’ve done so much for me,” he says. “I can’t—I don’t know where I would be right now if not for you.” He squeezes your hands. “Does it make me selfish?” he asks. “To think of myself at a moment like this?” 

“Didn’t I just tell you your life would be too high a price for me?” you ask. You look up from where your hands meet and smile. “If you’re selfish, then so am I.” 

He sucks in a breath. He opens his mouth. He closes it. You begin to speak, but he finally finds his voice: 

“Would you—that is—” 

You know what he’s going to say (he expects you to be two steps ahead, always), but you also know you cannot finish this sentence for him. Your breath is too short, and your hands shake in his. 

He takes a steadying breath. “My sister always followed her heart, so now I’m going to follow mine,” he says. “If you would have me—marry me?” 

There it is, in the open, pushing the air from your lungs in a _whoosh_. 

You can see him hanging on the precipice, clinging to this, and you wonder if he hasn’t been holding onto this for some time, and now that the dust is settled and he’s left with—well. 

He’s left with you, in this field, with friends just a ways ahead of you and corpses just a ways behind—left standing in the wake of a devastating war that left him less a sister and more of a man. 

It might be a bad idea. And it’s certainly poor timing. He’s likely running high on adrenaline and emotions, trying to tune out his grief, doing anything he can to find something worth hanging onto. 

All in all, tactically unsound. 

But you can see something else in his eyes—something raw, something earnest. A promise. 

And, as always, you find yourself overwhelmed by the depth of his trust, letting you see him like this—open and undone. 

You barely hear yourself speak over your own heartbeat.

“Yes,” you say, the only answer you could ever have. You reach up to touch his face. “Yes, Chrom.” 

His face breaks into a wide grin. “Gods—” In the space of a split second you are airborne, Chrom spinning you in an arcing circle that robs you of breath you thought was already gone. 

“Chrom!” you exclaim, laughing and throwing your arms ‘round his shoulders. “Chrom, put me—” 

He does, and then he kisses you square on the mouth, hands tangled in your war-torn hair. 

He pulls away a moment later. “With one word,” he says between breaths, “you’ve made me the happiest man in all the realm.” 

You can barely breathe, can barely feel your face despite the blood rushing to your cheeks.

“It won’t—” Chrom starts, stops. Starts again: “It won’t be easy, you know that?”

 You push some of the hair from his face while you rediscover use of your vocal chords. “Of course I do,” you tell him.

“Rebuilding will take time,” he says. “I have to put the halidom first, Emm would've—”

“Chrom,” you tell him, pressing your hand against his cheek. “I know.”

“Gods bless you, you always do,” he says, relief and gratitude coloring his voice. 

“I also know that I’ll be there every step of the way, doing whatever I can to help you.” You smile. “As always.”

He grins back. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

“I’m your tactician,” you mutter, lips brushing against his as he draws closer. “You really think I was going to let you do this on your own?”

Chrom laughs. “I’m going to ignore the implications there and continue to be grateful.” 

“Probably for the best,” you reply. 

He kisses you again, quick but deep. This time you’re the one doing the hair-tangling.  

When you pull away, he’s still smiling. “We’ll do this together.”

_Together._ The word hits something deep in your bones, something that suddenly bursts and rushes out, reaching from head to toe in something so all-encompassing you want to sing with it.

It sits on your tongue, light as a feather and weighty as a vow. 

“Together."

 

**Author's Note:**

> it feels so good to have this out of my system you have NO ID E A
> 
> [title was taken from "sweet love of mine" by joy williams]


End file.
